Back to work

So, this whole working thing is going all right. I haven't had to supplement with formula because I have figured out a schedule that allows me to provide enough milk for the baby. (Insert huge sigh of relief.) My eldest is simply ecstatic about going back to daycare and his miniature blond posse. He plays video games and watches movies that his father and I have deemed "obnoxious". What fun!

I still miss them though.

This only having two to three hours to be with them a day feels like a moral failure. Like it should literally be a crime for them to have a 40+ hour work week. Breech of child labor laws or something like that. Through this I am finding myself thinking of my childhood best friend's mother (say that five times fast...), who had four kids of her own. As a child, I didn't understand a lot of the things that she said to me while we were growing up and she was treating me as one of her own. But, my god, she was wise.

She told me and my best friend when we were around 11 or 12 to make sure we married someone like Mr. Rogers. "Mr. Rogers would make the best husband." I thought she was nuts. I mean, no pre-teen girl imagines the sweater and loafers at the end of the aisle. Still, after I made my requisite relationship blunders, I really kept in mind that someone "like Mr. Rogers" would make a good husband and father. Not so much the guy in front of "Picture, Picture" or the one traveling with preschoolers to the "Land of Make Believe", but more of the fellow who was honest and kind to animals and small children. The one who everyone seemed to be on good terms with. Someone who would make a good neighbor and was nice to his mother. And when I found my Mr. Wonder Bread, I married him. I don't think I will ever regret it.

I also remember another conversation that we had sitting at her kitchen table when I was also very young. I remember her face, the tears in her eyes, and the shaking of her voice with crystal clarity. I remember her telling me how she liked and missed being a stay-at-home mom. That she had all day to clean her house and do what she needed and when her kids came home from school, everything was done and she was able to make them a snack and ask about their day. To simply be with them. But something happened in the family and she needed to go to work. Money, insurance, or another of a hundred million reasons that necessitates a two salary household. She told me of how her life got so much more hectic and busy. About how her youngest son asked his mother to come and sit beside him on the sofa. She had so much to do; she kept repeating, "Just a minute. Let me finish this." But "this" never got finished. She kept putting him off to take care of other things that needed doing. Dishes. Cooking. Putting supper away. In the frenzy of household chores and before she could sit down with her child and ask him about his day, she glanced over and noticed he was asleep. There was nothing left to do but put him to bed. She had missed it. That thing. That moment. And it was gone.

And I remember her telling me this story and how I scorned her for being emotional and simple, with all of my 13 years. I remember the tears in her eyes. I can feel the tears in mine. I am so so afraid of her reality. I am afraid of it becoming my reality. She told me that she hoped I would never know how she felt. I wish her hopes had been realized. At least, I hope to learn from her experience.

In the end, I think of her often. Her words echo in my mind so often when I think of how to be a mother of two, knowing that she is a successful mother of four. How odd to find that after all these years, she has become a hero to me. An example of the kind of mother I wish I was. I should tell her this. I should tell her...

Thanks. For everything.